


Backstory

by okapi



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Emotional Manipulation, F/F, False Claims of Abuse, Fem!Anderson, Fem!Angelo, Fem!John - Freeform, Fem!Lestrade, Fem!Sherlock, Fem!mycroft, Femslash, Genderswap, Hurt/Comfort, Male!Ella - Freeform, Past Abuse, Physical Conflict, Sexual Dysfunction, Sexual Insecurity, Verbal Abuse, verbal conflict
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-14
Updated: 2014-01-17
Packaged: 2018-01-08 16:53:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 6,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1135128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/okapi/pseuds/okapi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How Sherlock and John might have gotten together in a genderswapped universe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please heed tags as warnings for potential triggers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am attempting to fit all my little stories into the same universe, but this is a very different type of beginning than the one John refers to in Crack in the Ice. I may write that one, too.

In the beginning, it was textbook. Sherlock and John were coming back to Baker Street from a case, late at night, high on adrenaline and victory. 

Sherlock had been brilliant, and John had been brave. They stood against the wall in the front entrance, laughing and marveling at the night’s events. Sherlock caught John’s eye and turned, leaning into her with obvious intent.

John slipped under Sherlock and away before they made contact, mumbling quickly, 

“Sorry, Sherlock. I’m not interested in women.”

“Right.” Sherlock answered to John’s back as the doctor retreated up the stairs. 

The next morning’s awkwardness soon dissipated, and they returned to normal. 

 

 

But three weeks later, John did something that she had not done yet.

She brought a man back to the flat. 

Someone she knew from army training, not well, but well enough to have a pint, and then three. They fucked twice before the sun rose. 

Sherlock was not in, she was overnighting at Bart’s, studying the organs of a mother and child who died of carbon monoxide poisoning. When she tumbled into the flat the next morning, John was finishing the washing-up, her companion long gone. 

Sherlock leaned into John, sniffing. Then she walked down the hall to her room.

“So, tell me, what _is_ the refractory period of the average British male these days?” she threw behind her. 

“Who said he was average?” countered John and slammed the cabinet door shut. John fumed, but did not return the man’s call.


	2. Chapter 2

A fortnight later, Sherlock was occupied collecting water samples from an outdoor drain at a crime scene. John was on stand-by, watching from afar as Sherlock contorted herself into various uncomfortable-looking positions, observing the flowing water.

Anderson greeted John. 

“Say, Dr. Watson, ummm, John. I was wondering, given that you’re a doctor, and what with your experience at crime scenes with Sherlock and all, if you might help me with something. It’s a draft of an article I’d like to publish on blood splatter. Would benefit from another set of eyes. If you have the time, of course. You’re probably pretty busy…”

John smiled at her. 

“Of course. I’m flattered. Just send it to me and I’ll take a look, tell you what I think.”

“We could meet for coffee or something and talk about it. Somewhere different from this.” She gave a nervous laugh and pushed her hair behind her ear.

“I’m quite sure that Dr. Watson is too busy to look at your homework assignment, Anderson. Perhaps you should find a tutor. Or a girlfriend.”

John stared at Sherlock, open-mouthed. Anderson cringed. 

“Sherlock, that’s…. Apologize!”

“She’s not a pathologist, she’s a _technician_. And no, Mother, I shan’t say I’m sorry!” Sherlock spat and stormed off.

“I am so…I don’t know what’s got into her…” John stammered, but Anderson was already gone. 

The tension in the cab back to Baker Street was palpable. 

“You were horrid! She had not done nor said anything to you! It was an unprecedented level of rudeness!”

“You are defending her sophomoric attempts to get in your knickers!”

“She was asking for my advice as a medical professional, a colleague…”

“Ha!” Sherlock sneered, “Let me break it to you, Doctor. No one—not even Anderson—is interested in you for your _brains_.”

John felt her blood run cold, and her temper ignite. 

“Really?” 

If John had been a little less tired and the hour a little earlier, she might have seen what was coming. Because Sherlock had told her plainly and she had seen it in evidence herself when Sherlock interviewed witnesses: people hate answering questions, but they love contradicting false statements.

It was a trap, a trap so obvious that every creature on the African savannah would have walked around it. But an ego-bruised, angry Watson? She walked right into it.

“I mean, you wouldn’t actually go on a _date_ with Anderson? Let her take you back to her disgusting bedsit?”

“And why not? She’s friendly…and puts up with a lot of verbal abuse from you, so we already have that in common…” John was so angry she couldn’t feel the twigs breaking beneath her feet.

“She’s _vile_.”

“She’s not…half-bad looking, when she’s not in a crime scene suit.” 

“But….”

“Sherlock, I’ll have you know, I have bedded scores of women…”

_Oh. Fuck._

John had replayed the near-kiss in her mind a myriad of times, each time wishing that she could have met Sherlock’s mouth with her own.

Sherlock stared at her, and John realized she was in the bottom of the pit. She was so furious with herself, with Sherlock, with the royal cock-up of the situation. She lashed out.

“Congrats, you got me. I am interested in women. And men. And probably bloody armadillos if they buy me enough pints! I am just not interested in _you_!” 

John clomped up the stairs and slammed her bedroom door.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Descriptions of perceived sexual dysfunction and sexual insecurity.
> 
> This is the only real Explicit part of the whole story. If you're a solid 'M' kind of reader, skip this one.

It took a few days longer, but once again, things got back to a slightly-strained normal. John picked up more shifts at the surgery, and Sherlock went to Belarus on something that wasn’t worth her time.

One evening, John found herself dozing in her chair. She rubbed her eyes when she awoke and noticed Sherlock sprawled on the sofa, apparently—incredibly so—dozing as well. She was in her dressing gown, a new one of emerald green silk. Her far leg was hitched just so; a swathe of creamy thigh was visible. John, embolden by her flatmate’s slumber, stared and allowed herself to imagine. The imagining led to a physical ache. She ached to run her tongue along that thigh, to feel Sherlock’s skin and downy hair on her tongue. To know what she tasted like. Right _there_. And then Sherlock’s hand was _there_. Sherlock's fingers ran up her leg, exactly where John wanted her tongue; touching herself, the way John ached to touch her. A raw hunger overwhelmed John, but she kept her gaze fixed on the leg, even when there was a faint whisper.

“ _John_ …”

She answered with a sorrowful “ _Good night, Sherlock_ ” and went up to bed, closing her door softly. 

John toed off her shoes and got into bed fully clothed. She shoved a pillow underneath her and undid her trousers, opening them slightly. She started to grind her hips, slowly. In the sanctuary of her room, she let herself imagine tasting Sherlock’s thigh, and then higher, until she was licking her folds and her clit, underneath Sherlock, surrounded by her, hearing her name, laced with desire, bursting forth from Sherlock’s lips. The sweetness she sought was elusive, though, and she soon stilled, so very tired and sad. Pathetic, when you think about it.

She did think about it. She knew that if she and Sherlock carried on down this path, it would surely end not only in run-of-the-mill heartache, but colossal annihilation of her world. John’s past and body and mind would be laid out for Sherlock just as it had been their first day at Bart’s. She would observe. She would know. John didn’t fool herself that she could pretend with Sherlock. And then, THEN, the nightmare would truly begin. Sherlock would want to experiment on her. To probe and to test. With equipment and drugs and whatever the hell else she could find. John shuddered at the possibilities outside her knowledge. Hell, Sherlock had already drugged her at Baskerville; John knew very well what her flatmate was capable of justifying in the name of science. John would let her and be humiliated, like the baboons and rabbits and rats at Baskerville. Like the mould and the thumbs and the soil samples. _Data, John_. The thought made her stomach churn and bile rise in her throat. Tears welled in her eyes. And, then, THEN, she’d be binned like the mould and the soil and even the rats—when she stopped proving _interesting_. 

John’s final thought before she fell asleep was:

_This is the beginning of the end._


	4. Chapter 4

The next evening John noticed that her pillowcase was missing.

“Sherlock, did you take my pillowcase?”

“I used it for an experiment.”

 _Oh, God. Oh, God. It was happening already. Too soon. Too soon._ She wanted a little more time before the fire started kindling under this bridge between them. Before her lifeline started to fray. She felt a spasm in her left hand.

John hissed, “When will you stop appropriating what isn’t yours?”

“I’ll replace it if it’s so important.” Sherlock growled, “It’s a bloody sack.”

“You’ll leave everything in that room,” John pointed up the stairs, “alone. You aren’t entitled to anything, no matter what they taught you at your public school.”

_Nice, Watson, nothing like throwing classism on a row to get it good and ugly._

John stomped into the kitchen. Sherlock hurled herself down the hall to her room.

“Do we’ve anything in?” John opened the refrigerator. “What a selfish, selfish bitch! Are you _ever_ going to buy milk?” she asked of what she thought was an empty room. She turned, and Sherlock was looming behind her.

They were locked in an angry stare when Sherlock’s telephone beeped.


	5. Chapter 5

Thirty-six hours later, Sherlock and John were trapped in a large shipping container. The criminals had fled, and Lestrade had been notified so there was nothing to do but wait to be rescued. It was cold and dank. John could hear rats scurrying along the corrugated iron ceiling. She was gripped by the hypervigilance of a traumatized soldier.

“If you don’t stop panting, you’ll use our air up that much faster,” charged Sherlock. The light of her mobile formed an electronic candle between them. They had both checked and rechecked and rechecked the entire space for potential escapes and came up with nothing, except increasing frustration and scraped hands.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I can’t regulate my bodily functions with precision like some people. I’m not a fucking _machine_!” she retorted, her words echoing off the walls.

At that moment, the battery in Sherlock’s phone died, and their world went black. John hung her head. Silence enveloped them.

Sherlock’s voice cut through it, “Is that why….why….because you think I’m not capable of…because you think…?”

_Oh Lord._ For all John knew, the bad guys might come back, the air might run out, and this might be her last few minutes on earth with Sherlock and was she really going to spend it hurting her?

“No, no, no. I am just scared and angry and want to get out of here so badly, love. I’m sorry for lashing out. Sherlock, where are you?” John reached out her arms, searching in the inky blackness. If the lights had been on, John would have been astounded at the way Sherlock positively melted at the term of endearment, a term that John threw casually at her because she used it perennially for Sherlock within the confines of her own mind. A word that John would not remember saying, were she pressed later. She brushed the detective’s hair and felt for her face, pulling her close. Sherlock laid her head in John’s lap and instinctively, John started to stroke her hair, pulled free from its binding earlier in the evening when they were frantically looking for a way out. 

“ _Why, John_?” Sherlock’s voice broke; the question hung in the air. 

John could not keep her own voice steady, either, “ _Sherlock…_ ”

There was a loud bang, and the box vibrated. A blinding light shined on them from above, and a voice boomed behind it.

“Oy, ladies! You two look positively wretched. What, did you not think I was coming? You know that’s why they give me the title Detective Inspector, because I am bloody good at finding things, like idiots like you two. Come on, up you go. Hospital then the station, you’re not getting off so easy tonight.”

For the first time since she met Sherlock, John did not object to going to the hospital, did not object to any test or waiting for any test result before going to the station. Dawn was breaking when she finished her statement to Lestrade. She did not wait for Sherlock. She took a cab home and slept for the next fourteen hours.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mentions of past (non-specific) abuse, false claims of abuse, verbal and physcial conflict, emotional manipulation.

It was night when John plodded downstairs, made a cup of tea, and was reminded that there was nothing in. She had a quick shower and dressed. She grabbed her keys, wallet, and jacket, intending to pop ‘round to the shop before it closed when she heard a voice from the sofa say,

“Still waiting for an answer.”

“Not going to get one, Sherlock. Not tonight.” John headed toward the stairs.

Sherlock’s voice turned steely, “Your lies are transparent. Your explanations, flimsy. I see through you, John. Really, a 2 year-old could see through you. You don’t like women, lie. You don’t want me, also lie. What’s your next lie? That we aren’t compatible? That you don’t want to ‘ruin our friendship’? 

“That, my friend, is the truth,” replied John, her temper flaring. “But you are well on your way to doing that all by yourself.”

“I am going to figure it out. I am going to put 2 and 2 and whatever other number is in your very vacant mind and come up with an answer. The real answer.” Sherlock was towering over John, subconsciously or—John thought more likely—consciously trying to intimidate her. The fact that she was articulating, very precisely, John’s chief fear did not ease the situation.

“Why are you pushing so hard for something I obviously don’t want?!” cried John.

“When I hear the real reason why you don’t want it, I’ll be satisfied. You will never hear another word about it,” Sherlock hissed.

John took another step toward the stairs, her back to Sherlock.

_God forgive me, God forgive me, Holy Mother and all the Blessed Saints and Angels, for what I am about to do._

“Sherlock, I was… _abused_ ,” she let the word fall from her lips. “It was in the army, right before I got shot, I don’t want to talk about it, and…I just can’t. I need you to respect that, Sherlock, and back off. Please.” She was expecting to see shock, maybe a hint of embarrassment, or maybe concern shielded by cool disinterest. 

But when she turned she saw blind rage. 

“ _ABUSE?!_ Who exactly do you think you are lying to? A simpleton, a drunk, a child, or _Anderson_? You, John Watson, were not abused, not in the army or anywhere else. _ABUSE_!” Sherlock spat the last word with such vehemence that John felt the drops of saliva on her cheek. With Sherlock’s next words, John was backed into a wall, literally and figuratively as Sherlock leaned into her.

“STOP LYING! JUST STOP SPEAKING ENTIRELY! I WILL FIGURE IT OUT, YOU STUPID, STUPID WOMAN. BUT MAKE NO MISTAKE, YOU WERE NOT ABUSED. I KNOW… _ABUSE_!” Sherlock mimicked John’s voice grotesquely.

And that was it. John knew in that moment that she would burn this beautiful bridge between them to the ground. And she knew how. 

“You know about abuse, Sherlock? Tell me about it.” John was pushing back now, openly sneering, “Daddy sneak into little Shirley’s room at night? Mummy ‘disciplining’ you with a hairbrush? Or did Grandpapa just have to check his little pretty’s ‘purity’ over and over and OVER AGAIN?!”

John was no stranger to physical altercations, but she did not see the fist. She didn’t even feel the crack to her bottom lip until the blood was running down her chin. She let it run. Not moving.

She watched the horror flood Sherlock’s face. Watched her as she stood, dazed and trembling, with her hands clasped over her mouth in cartoonish dismay. 

“Brilliant deduction as usual, Sherlock. I was never actually abused by someone I loved. Until. Now.” When she walked down the stairs, calmly whistling “The Circle of Life”, she thought she could actually smell smoke. 

 

John walked for hours and then took the cheapest room she could find for the night. Were Sherlock and John to have the kind of soulmate telepathy that you read about in stories, they might have learned that they were quite a pair that night, John sipping from a bottle and Sherlock smoking, each looking up at the London sky, each in awe of how she had so swiftly and surely destroyed the most precious thing in her life.


	7. Chapter 7

John knew the easiest way to remove yourself from society is to work at night. Night shift, third shift, graveyard shift, whatever the name, you work when most of the world is asleep and sleep when most of the world is up doing their business. John picked up some locum work at night in the A & E of a hospital. 

She chose the hospital quite carefully. First, it was on the opposite side of town from her grimy bedsit. That meant she spent much of the time that she wasn’t sleeping or working on buses and the tube. Thus, her night was lengthened and her day shortened even more so. Less time to thrash and sweat through nightmares. Less time to consider her gloomy surroundings and the events that had brought her there. Moving, if not forward, then at least horizontally, across the city.

Secondly, the hospital had a dodgy reputation. This meant that they were usually short staffed, so John could work as much as she wanted. Also, the A & E of a dodgy hospital attracts a certain element of society, both as patients, staff, and related contacts. Through these contacts, John was able to secure a new firearm. She had left Baker Street with only what was on her back and in her pockets. Her gun was the only possession she truly missed. Her new piece was a small handgun, almost toy-looking, but she felt a little calmer during the day, when she slept, knowing it was within arm’s reach. 

Her mobile was also back at Baker Street so she did not hear a message:

“John, you need to come to the address I am going to give you immediately and get Sherlock. Now. I don’t know what’s going on, but she’s completely out of control. If she carries on the way she’s going, I am going to have to arrest her, and that Sandman of a sister of hers will not be able to save her. She’s forcing my hand, John. Please.”

The weeks passed, and John’s limp returned. Her nightmares grew darker. 

_She was running, running, running, something was behind her, something chasing her. She flew across a wooden bridge that fell apart with every step. It was behind her, rustling, thumping, calling her name. She had to fight back. She had to defend herself._

John heard a noise, reached for her gun, and pointed it toward the door.

“Are you going to hurt me with that pea-shooter, Watson, or just win me a prize at the fair?”


	8. Chapter 8

“You found me,” said John.

“I keep telling you, Watson. Detective. Inspector. It’s on the badge, it’s on the door. It means that I can find things. Even things that don’t want to be found. _Especially_ things that don’t want to be found.” Lestrade smiled.

“Please, have a seat,” John indicated the only chair in the room. “Tea?”

“Love some. Thanks.” Lestrade sat, assessing the room. Finally, she said, “This is…cheery, in a were-there-no-prison-cells-available? kind of way.”

“It suits me,” countered John, but she was too tired to be defensive. John handed her a steaming mug.

“Hmmm.” Lestrade stood and paced around the room, sipping. John returned to sit on the bed.

“You’ve been here…how long? And I don’t see one prayer card. One statue of a Papist idol nature…,” Lestrade teased. "Or even a rosary.” She made a show of looking under the bed. “Have you even darkened the door of a church since it happened?”

John looked down at the bed and fingered the sheets. She shook her head.

“You must be starving.”

And that was it. That was the word. John was starving. Starving for solace and comfort. Starving for stimulation and challenge. Starving for purpose. Starving for sleep that refreshed and food that nourished and prayer that succored.

Lestrade fished a string of dull-coloured beads from her pocket and tossed them on the bed beside John. 

“A loaner. Do you think Our Lady has abandoned you?”

“Wouldn’t blame her. She’s got good taste.” 

“It doesn’t work like that, and you know it.” Lestrade was standing in front of John, brushing the top of her head. “So where are you working now?”

John told her.

“Wow. So that. And this?” She indicated the room with a vague sweep of the hand. “What are you punishing yourself for, my dear?”

John didn’t answer. Didn’t lift her head.

“Alright. Here’s the plan. We’re going to get you to a church and get you confessed…” John whined in protest.

"Hush. And then—because I know for a fact that the local down the street is going to be raided and shut down tonight—we’ll go to mine and get royally pissed. You can kip on my sofa tonight. Just no funny business or Olga will get angry.”

“Olga? Your new girl?” asked John.

“German Sheppard mix. Best bomb-sniffing dog in London, but they were going to put her down, just because she’s got a little grey in her fur. And well…we can’t have that, can we? The lady downstairs takes care of her for me when I’m on a case, but she likes to sleep at the foot of the bed when I’m home.”

“Most faithful bitch that bed has seen, I'd say,” quipped John, and she gave Lestrade the first full, real smile she’d had in months.

“Don’t I know it?” said Lestrade. 

John stopped as they were leaving.

“I don’t want to talk about it, Greg.”

“Talk about what? How your team is like Heather Mills? The second leg is just for show.”


	9. Chapter 9

John and Lestrade were sitting at the bar, well into their third pint, when John got up the nerve to ask. 

“Okay. Tell me. How is she?” She kept her eyes fixed on the television behind the bar.

“Rehab.”

John’s head hit the bar, matching the leaden punch she felt in her gut. _No, no, no._

“She didn’t actually relapse.”

“No?” John raised her head slightly to look at Lestrade.

“No. Her sister sucks at the teat of the Dark Lord himself. That’s the only explanation I can come up with for the fact that she assaulted police staff…”

“She hit you too?!” John looked dismayed.

“No,” said Lestrade, considering the wall behind John. “But that explains a few things. No, she hit…”

“ _Anderson_.”

“Yup. Almost put that girl in hospital. And yet somehow—despite all my efforts to the contrary—she is not in a prison cell that looks much like your current lodgings. She’s in rehab. Sixty days. In the Caymans.”

John leaned back and gave a mirthless laugh at the ceiling. “She’s on holiday. In a tropical paradise. And we’re…”

“Exactly.”

“Let’s switch to whiskey.”

“Amen.”


	10. Chapter 10

More time passed. One day, exhausted from a fitful sleep and drained from dragging her leg around, John made an appointment with Ella. She did not like Ella. He had the irritating, unruffable calm of his ilk, but she did not want to start at the beginning with a new psychiatrist and have to slog through session after session of the past until she reached the salient part. 

She had changed her mind four times before she reached the right street. Time for the sun to be hidden by dark clouds. Thunder boomed, and rain poured, soaking her to the bone. She ducked into a coffee shop directly opposite her destination, seeking shelter from the storm. 

But everyone else in London had had the same idea, and the shop was packed with patrons, bursting its capacity. When she saw the queue curled and snaked up on itself many times, she gave up the idea of actually buying a coffee and slowly inched her way through the throng. She spotted one empty stool at the window and sat down. The glass was fogged with condensation. 

_This is what my life has become._ She put her forehead down on the sliver of counter as if she were bending to pray. She took a deep breath.

_Oh God._

Sherlock was near. She smelled her. She would wager all she had or would ever earn that Sherlock was somewhere in the mass of people. Chemicals and tea and fragrance and violin rosin and hair product and all the other minutiae that swirled together to make her scent. John’s blood sang. She might even be right beside her. John froze. 

_I’ll just sit and breathe her in. Maybe she’s spotted me. Maybe she hasn’t. Maybe it matters. Maybe she’ll disappear. Breathe. Her. Breathe. Her. Breathe._

Oddly enough, John fell asleep. 

 

John woke when her nose scraped hard on the counter as she half slipped off the stool. 

“Oy, you two lot! Buy something or be off. We’ve got no space for tramps!” 

John stared at the proprietor and realized he was looking at her. The rain had ceased, and the shop had emptied. She turned and saw beside her a homeless man that smelled exactly like Sherlock. The man gave a feeble half-smile. 

_Sherlock!_

“Jesus Christ!”

“Not quite.” 

Then they were both being shoved unceremoniously out the door of the shop.

“What, are you in disguise for a case or something?” John asked.

“Something like that.”

“Well, you fooled me. And that man,” John pointed toward the shop. She ran her hand through her wet hair. “Ummm. Okay, well...”

“Are you…hungry?” Sherlock asked tentatively.

_God, yes._

“Starving.”


	11. Chapter 11

Maria Angelo had four daughters. She had five granddaughters and three great-granddaughters. All of whom had been raised in her home, under her roof. There wasn’t anything about a girl’s heart, its hope and its bitterness, that Maria did not know.

So when she saw the two figures enter her restaurant, she knew that they were not homeless vagrants. She certainly did not make the foolish assumption that they were _men_ , no matter their appearance. She knew exactly who they were. 

And she knew that she was witnessing something very, very fragile. Like a delicate piece of china. Like a fledgling animal that had almost no hope of survival in the wild. So she greeted the two, seated them, dismissed the assigned waiter, and waited on them herself. 

She cut la Doctora a nice healthy slice of tiramisu. She made sure la Loca’s wine glass was full, but not too full. She did not interrupt. She slipped a candle between the two so surreptitiously that she almost lamented that her pick-pocketing and burglaring days were over. She hoped. Then she prayed. Then she got on with her business.

 

They ate in silence. John was not sure how to begin. Dessert appeared, and she devoured it. The sweet, rich flavor left her dangerously emboldened.

“Anything interesting lately?”

“Well, I did have my own Caribbean mystery.” Sherlock’s expression was trying—and failing miserably—at modesty.

“It was the bloke with the glass eye that did it! He was looking over the wrong shoulder! A photo of a hibiscus!” John grinned. 

“Something like that.” Sherlock leaned back and took a sip of wine.

John leaned back, too, and noticed a cup of coffee in front of her. 

“Alright, let’s hear it…” John coaxed. 

“Well, it all started when…”

 

“That’s extraordinary. Truly. I can’t believe I missed out on that…” John swallowed nervously. “I mean…ummm…that is to say….”

“You were there, in your own way,” Sherlock said softly.

“Well, I have to go if I want to catch the last train back.”

“Right.”

_What happens next? What happens next? What do I do? What do I want to do? What does she want?_

John was amazed that her feet were moving to the door because her mind was paralyzed with anxiety. 

The cool night air hit her, and a crystal clear thought rang in her head. One that calmed her.

_I’ll just do what I have always done: follow her lead._


	12. Chapter 12

_An olive branch, an olive leaf, a chewed up piece of olive pit, give me anything, Sherlock and I will meet you half way. Backwards in high heels, as always._

That was what John was thinking, but when she and Sherlock emerged from Angelo’s what she said was:

“Good to see you, Sherlock.” 

“Likewise.”

They turned in opposite directions. Exit stage right, exit stage left.

“John?”

_Oh, here it comes!_

“Your belongings are still at Baker Street anytime you wish to…”

 _Olive nothing. Just Awkward Break-up Conversation #1: the Division of Stuff._ Disappointment bled into anxiety, though, when John considered returning to the Baker Street flat. She wasn’t ready.

“…or I could have them sent ‘round. If you give me your address.”

“Like you don’t know precisely where I’m living, Sherlock,” John leveled her with a frosty glare. “By the scuffs on my shoes and the dirt on my collar.”

“Even I can’t produce an exact address from thin air, John. I could, of course, make inquiries, but I haven’t. I believe they call it ‘respecting a boundary’.” 

“Pick that up in rehab, did you?” 

“Yes, as a matter of fact.” John dropped her eyes from Sherlock’s at this, embarrassed by the honesty reflected in Sherlock’s face. 

“Send them ‘round to Lestrade’s. I’ll pick them up from there.”

“Fine, but there is one _item_ that you might prefer to retrieve in person.”

_My gun._

“Yeah, well, let Lestrade know a good time to drop by, a time when I won’t _disturb_ you, and I’ll pick it up.”

“Fair enough. Good night.” Sherlock turned briskly and left. 

“Good night, Sherlock,” sighed John to Sherlock’s retreating back.


	13. Chapter 13

The next week, John collected two boxes from Lestrade’s. In the middle of her jumpers was a velvet bag that she did not recognize. She opened it and took out a large conch shell. Like a child, she held it up to her ear and listened to the whooshing of a far off ocean. She ran her finger along the spiky outer ridges and smooth pink interior. She placed it on the window sill. It reminded her of the skull at Baker Street, and that made her smile. 

 

Two weeks later, she got a message from Lestrade:

“John, Sherlock wanted me to tell you that she’s going to Cardiff for three days if you want to collect your remaining belongings from the flat. Normally, I’d object to passing notes like we’re in primary school and tell you two to talk to each other directly, but she’s solved five cold cases for me in the last two weeks—the first two without ever having seen the case files. She did it without taking credit or showing off or putting any of my people in hospital so I’m feeling a little benevolent. I am not going to let her back on a live case any time soon—Anderson’s transferred, by the way—but, I don’t know, maybe one day. Take care, love.”

 

Sometimes the anticipation is much more dreadful than the reality, and such was the case with returning to 221B. The next morning, John stopped by on her way home from a long and arduous shift at the hospital. She trudged up the stairs. She noted that the flat was remarkably clean and orderly. Perhaps Sherlock had not had time to throw it into disrepair following her return from rehab. She did not linger, but tossed her keys on the table and went straight upstairs. She found her gun exactly as she had left it. She sat on the edge of the bed, which also was made up exactly as before, and then flopped on her back, staring up at the ceiling.

There was something lumpy under her back. Maybe she had left a pair of pajamas behind. She reached under the duvet and sheet and pulled out a bundle of soft fabric.

It was Sherlock’s silk blue dressing gown, her favorite. 

John brought it to her nose and was flooded with the scent of Sherlock. _Oh, oh, oh._ A battle began to wage within her. 

_You’re so tired. Wrap yourself in Sherlock and take a little nap._  
 _**Put it back, take your gun, and leave this place behind, all of it and her, too.** _  
_It smells so good and feels so soft. She won’t notice._  
 _**Are you barking? Of course she’ll notice. She notices everything. Plus, you smell like urine and pus and vomit and sweat and disinfectant. You stink. You’re defiling this pretty little thing by even touching it. Leave! Get out!** _  
_You could get clean, and then take a little nap. It won’t hurt anything. And so what if she notices? She knows you’re coming anyway. She’ll wash it. Well, someone will._  
 _**Leave! Get out!** _  
_You’re so tired._

In the end, John padded down the stairs with the dressing gown. She took the hottest shower that she could stand, scrubbing her skin raw. She dried off and slipped into Sherlock’s gown. Then, she crept back up the stairs. 

_Oh, oh, OH_. How could Sherlock bear to wear such things next to her skin? It was too much sensation, Sherlock’s scent and the delicate silk, enveloping her. She wanted to…. She wanted to…. She crawled into bed, found her release, and fell asleep.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mentions of (non-specific) past abuse.

It was dark when John awoke. She was disconcerted, not sure where she was. 

_Baker Street._

She sat up, looked around and then blinked twice. 

_Tea!_

There was a mug of tea on the bedside table. 

She reached out her hand. The mug was warm. She stared at it, incredulous, and then sipped. 

_Tea!_

She got up, pulling Sherlock’s dressing gown around her and hugging the cup. She descended the stairs slowly. Her stomach growled when the scent of bacon hit her. 

Sherlock was in the kitchen, in her green dressing gown with loose pajamas peeking out at the edges. Her back was to John, and she was… _cooking_.

John stared some more. 

“Good. You’re up. John, don’t stand there, gaping. I do know _how_ to cook. It’s chemistry, following instructions, things I’m ostensibly good at. Please sit down.” She indicated a place at the table that was… _set_. 

John sat down. Stunned into silence, she sipped her tea. Sherlock fluttered around the kitchen and then sat a plate in front of John, brimming with eggs and bacon and toast and tomatoes. John stared at the plate.

“Eat,” said Sherlock. 

John ate. 

Sherlock sat down opposite John with a cup of tea and two dry pieces of toast.

They ate in silence; then Sherlock said, “You’ll need to borrow some clothes…”

John looked down and remembered the dressing gown. She flushed and pulled it tight to her chest, stammering, “I’m sorry, Sherlock. I’ll wash it and drop it ‘round…” 

Sherlock got up and circled around behind John, putting her hands lightly on John’s shoulders to stop the quivering. John heard in a low voice:

“You shan’t do anything of the kind. I know your scent as surely as you know mine, as you knew it the other day in the coffee shop. I know its many _facets_.” Sherlock dropped her voice even lower on the last word, impregnating it with meaning. “And now that your scent is upon this, it shan’t be washed for a long time. And, my _scent_ will be added to it, many fold; trust me, John.” 

John was reeling.

Reeling from the meaning of Sherlock’s words. 

Reeling from the fact that Sherlock was taking the plates and… _doing the washing up!_

Reeling from her final words: _Trust me, John. Trust me. Trust me._

That’s what it all came down to. _Could she trust Sherlock with her body and mind? Could she trust her to treat her with gentleness and understanding of a lover, not the cold, transitory interest of a scientist?_

John pondered. _But how could Sherlock trust her? When she had mocked her pain and manipulated her so viciously?_

Sherlock was at the sink, rinsing the plates. John took a deep breath.

“Please forgive me, Sherlock. For what I did.” Once John started, it all came tumbling out. “I knew what I was doing and deliberately provoked you. Deliberately used your pain and your weakness against you. It was so very wrong.” John bowed her head. 

Plates clamored in the sink.

“John, you liberate _spiders_ from the _bath_. And yet, I provoked you to be unspeakably cruel—and, make no mistake, you were ruthless— so what does that make me?” Sherlock’s voice sounded lost, “Not to mention the fact that I _struck_ you….”

“Stop it. Stop it,” said John. _Oh, God. I am going to have to tell her._

“Sherlock, listen, please, listen. I didn’t want to…. Of course, I am interested, but….” 

Sherlock turned to face her.

“Sherlock, I am broken.” _There, it was out._

“Broken?”

“ _Physically_ broken.” 

Sherlock raised an eyebrow and sat down in front of John at the table. She was looking like a cat looks seconds before it pounces, with careful appraisal and supreme readiness. 

“How so?”

“I can’t…. I am not able to….” 

“John, I can smell it on you…”

“On my own, yes. But with…”

“Men?”

“Anyone.”

“Since…?”

“Ever.” John looked at the floor.

“But, three continents…?”

“Is true.”

“And no one…?” 

John shrugged and bit her lip. 

Sherlock put her fingers to her lips in contemplation. 

“You fake it. John, look at me. All of it?”

“A lot of it. The end, of course.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know!” John gave a frustrated cry . Sherlock’s eyes danced.

“That look, Sherlock, right there! That’s why I didn’t tell you! I am not some lab rat, some Baskerville animal in a cage. I don’t know why I don’t work, I don’t know, and I’m old enough to know or at least have some idea. I’m good. I am so very good. No one has ever noticed. But I knew I couldn’t fake it with you. You would know. Somehow. And now that you know you’re going to want to test and experiment and put things in me and on me and I just can’t. I can’t be prodded and probed and then binned when I’m not interesting anymore! I am just _damaged_ , and you just need to accept that.” John shoved the heels of her palms in her eyes to stop the tears. 

“I am broken. Just let me be _broken_.”

Silence hung heavy between them.

“My dear girl,” said Sherlock softly, approaching John with an expression that John couldn’t read. She held out her hand. John took it and allowed herself to be led to the sofa and cocooned in Sherlock’s arms. 

“I believe it is time that I told you a story…”


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mentions of (non-specific) past abuse and perceived sexual dysfunction.

By the end of Sherlock’s story, John’s sobs were being punctuated by plaintive wails. She cried for Sherlock. For herself. She thought she might have shed a tear for every little girl in the world.

Sherlock just held her and let her cry, slowly scraping her chapped lips back and forth across John’s brow. 

When John finally quieted, she asked, “And Mycroft?”

“Mycroft’s story is hers to tell.” It was one of the few mature statements John ever heard Sherlock utter in reference to her sister. John let it go.

“Now, John, that you know my story, does the doctor in you want to…heal me?”

“Of course.”

“And does the soldier in you want to…protect me?”

“Naturally.” 

John raised her head and looked at Sherlock through puffy eyes, “But it isn’t because I think you need fixing or because I think you can’t protect yourself.” John sat up. “It’s because being a doctor and a soldier is the best of who I am and I want to give that to you, to help you in any way I can, because I love you, Sherlock, so very, very much.” 

Sherlock smiled. 

“And I, John, am a scientist and a detective. So when you come to me and tell there is something that you don’t understand, something that puzzles you, indeed, that troubles you, I want to help you with the best of who I am. Yes, I want to take you apart and see how you work. And put you back together, to our _mutual_ pleasure. But not out of puerile interest, not ‘for science’, and certainly not because I consider you a disposible instrument, but because I feel as you do. Because, amazingly, you cherish me the way that I cherish you. Despite my being so very, very _broken_.” 

The moon was still high outside Baker Street, but inside, it was dawning in John’s mind. She felt a fundamental shift in her being, and she lamented—not for the first, nor the last time—how it was that she could see, but not _observe_.

Because what she saw etched on Sherlock’s face was love. 

She did not know how long it had been there, but now she recognized it for what it was. 

So, she slowly and deliberately untied the sash on the dressing gown. 

And let Sherlock in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
